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Que lire après Vive la RévolutionVoir plus
Critiques, Analyses et Avis (1)
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La Révolution Française, racontée par un anglais en mode humoristique. C'est absolument hilarant.
L'auteur est très pro-révolution - le livre est entre autres une entreprise de réhabilitation pour montrer qu'elle ne se limite pas à la Terreur, qui est la vision qu'en donnent souvent les media hors de France. le côté pro-révolution, pro-français et pro-république est même parfois un peu embarrassant tellement il est fort, c'est dire.
Le côté humoristique a deux aspects principaux, le premier consistant à insister sur les petits détails triviaux et personnels, ce qui rend l'ensemble plus humain, et parfois pas très éloigné d'un roman d'aventure (pourquoi personne ne m'avait jamais expliqué les points de détail matériels de la prise de la Bastille ou la fuite à Varennes ou la première confrontation entre Marat et Robespierre lors d'un procès sur le paratonnerre ?).
Le second consiste à faire des comparaisons déjantées avec l'époque moderne, celui-là est plus discutable parce que
1) Parfois c'est choisi pour être drôle plutôt que pertinent (et qu'est-ce que c'est drôle ! J'avoue !)
2) l'époque moderne en question a dix ans, pour les comparaisons d'actualité ça a vieilli
3) l'époque moderne en question est anglophone, ce qui aide certainement les lecteurs anglophones à comprendre mais fait des cas où en tant que français on comprend mieux les faits que les explications et les comparaisons. ^^
4) Et l'auteur ne cache absolument pas qu'il est militant de gauche quand il fait des comparaisons - le plus souvent pour souligner les différences - avec l'activisme moderne. Selon les opinions politiques du lecteur, cela peut être difficile de sympathiser. Au moins, l'auteur affiche son biais et n'essaie pas de se présenter comme totalement objectif sur les interprétations, même si tous les faits, eux, sont tirés de sources bibliographiques précises.
Le mélange, malgré ces réserves, est très réussi. J'étais à la fois morte de rire, exaltée, et horrifiée, et j'ai rarement eu plus de sympathie pour les différents acteurs de cette période de l'histoire, dans tous les camps. En racontant leurs ambitions comme leurs ridicules, ils semblent plus humains que jamais.
Je le recommande vivement !
L'auteur est très pro-révolution - le livre est entre autres une entreprise de réhabilitation pour montrer qu'elle ne se limite pas à la Terreur, qui est la vision qu'en donnent souvent les media hors de France. le côté pro-révolution, pro-français et pro-république est même parfois un peu embarrassant tellement il est fort, c'est dire.
Le côté humoristique a deux aspects principaux, le premier consistant à insister sur les petits détails triviaux et personnels, ce qui rend l'ensemble plus humain, et parfois pas très éloigné d'un roman d'aventure (pourquoi personne ne m'avait jamais expliqué les points de détail matériels de la prise de la Bastille ou la fuite à Varennes ou la première confrontation entre Marat et Robespierre lors d'un procès sur le paratonnerre ?).
Le second consiste à faire des comparaisons déjantées avec l'époque moderne, celui-là est plus discutable parce que
1) Parfois c'est choisi pour être drôle plutôt que pertinent (et qu'est-ce que c'est drôle ! J'avoue !)
2) l'époque moderne en question a dix ans, pour les comparaisons d'actualité ça a vieilli
3) l'époque moderne en question est anglophone, ce qui aide certainement les lecteurs anglophones à comprendre mais fait des cas où en tant que français on comprend mieux les faits que les explications et les comparaisons. ^^
4) Et l'auteur ne cache absolument pas qu'il est militant de gauche quand il fait des comparaisons - le plus souvent pour souligner les différences - avec l'activisme moderne. Selon les opinions politiques du lecteur, cela peut être difficile de sympathiser. Au moins, l'auteur affiche son biais et n'essaie pas de se présenter comme totalement objectif sur les interprétations, même si tous les faits, eux, sont tirés de sources bibliographiques précises.
Le mélange, malgré ces réserves, est très réussi. J'étais à la fois morte de rire, exaltée, et horrifiée, et j'ai rarement eu plus de sympathie pour les différents acteurs de cette période de l'histoire, dans tous les camps. En racontant leurs ambitions comme leurs ridicules, ils semblent plus humains que jamais.
Je le recommande vivement !
Citations et extraits (5)
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Robespierre became a law student, a poet and a devoted admirer of Rousseau. As a lawyer he worked fourteen hours each day, and was then visited by a barber who shaved him and powdered his face. Throughout his adult life he always wore a cravat (carrying a spare in case the first one became creased) lace cuffs and a waistcoat, and carried a hat he never worn in case it disturbed his hair, which was curled into two side-rolls and powdered, while at the back was a pigtail tied in a black satin ribbon. He never drank alcohol, and there's no record of him having a "girlfriend" or "boyfriend". His every action was meticulous and measured, which had led to an image as the archetypal humourless leftie. He didn't really help to combat this image when he wrote to a friend from a relative's house: "Every moment since our arrival has been devoted to pleasure. Ever since Saturday I have eaten tart. What a temptation to spend the night eating even more!" Even this sordid behaviour was rejected because "I then reflected upon the beauty of mastering one's passions." It was an outlook that earned him the nickname "the Incorruptible".
From every contemporary account it seems that Robespierre was utterly single-minded, driven and committed to whatever task was before him. He was probably the sort of activist who would ring you at one in the morning and say "I want to speak to you because I feel you're not convinced about the political importance of changing the meeting night from Tuesday to Wednesday," the type who would be invited to a wedding and say, "Ah that will be handy as Terry will be there and I need to convince him to take over as treasurer," and then look utterly bemused when Terry says, "Not now Robespierre, I'm getting married in ten minutes."
From every contemporary account it seems that Robespierre was utterly single-minded, driven and committed to whatever task was before him. He was probably the sort of activist who would ring you at one in the morning and say "I want to speak to you because I feel you're not convinced about the political importance of changing the meeting night from Tuesday to Wednesday," the type who would be invited to a wedding and say, "Ah that will be handy as Terry will be there and I need to convince him to take over as treasurer," and then look utterly bemused when Terry says, "Not now Robespierre, I'm getting married in ten minutes."
Similarly, Jean-Paul Marat sledge-hammered his way through the French Revolution. In one issue of _L'Ami du Peuple_ he wrote the statement that has been seized on ever since as proof of his crow-like, toad-like insanity, when he suggested that all it would take to cleanse France of all unhappiness was the execution of a selected 273000 people. The chilling thing about this figure is its precision. If he's said 100000 or even a million, it could be witten off as an outburst, in the way sometimes might say, "To sort out America someone has to execute a million people" while watching an edition of _Jerry Springer_. But to get to 273000 he must have worked it our carefully, sitting there with a pen and paper, saying, "Priests, yes, definitely put them down, that's 8000. Now, bank managers, hmm, tricky - baah, fuck it, put them down, that's another thousand. _Assistant_ bank managers, no, they're not so bad, leave them. Maybe just do the worst fifty."
Yet the more strident he was, the more popular he became. He was elected to the Convention after the September massacres, which ha had accepted as a necessary strategy, and once a deputy he ranted in glorious fashion at the slightest provocation. When he was accused by a Girondin of wishing for a dictatorship he went berserk, but just as the room had cooled down he pulled out his pistol and put it to his own head, shouting that if the remark wasn't withdrawn he would blow his head off.
Yet the more strident he was, the more popular he became. He was elected to the Convention after the September massacres, which ha had accepted as a necessary strategy, and once a deputy he ranted in glorious fashion at the slightest provocation. When he was accused by a Girondin of wishing for a dictatorship he went berserk, but just as the room had cooled down he pulled out his pistol and put it to his own head, shouting that if the remark wasn't withdrawn he would blow his head off.
The other consideration often strangely forgotten is that the Terror took place in a country under siege. It was part of the war. And not a modern war, in which people feel they're participating in the midst of battle because they watch the TV discussions, or write newspapers columns about it. This was a war in which every person in France was a participant, because the royalist armies had declared their intention to treat anyone who didn't help restore the monarchy as an enemy. It became a test to ask each other in France "If the Duke of Brunswick arrived, what would do have done to deserve execution?"
The Terror was part of the war. Yet from Carry On film to professional academic, the war of which the Terror was one part is ignored, leaving the image of a handful of maniacs bent on blood-lust and vengeance. It's as if a history of the British suggested we all went insane around 1944, blacking out windows at night, sleeping in underground stations and sailing across to Normandy to shoot thousands on the beach for no apparent reason.
The Terror was part of the war. Yet from Carry On film to professional academic, the war of which the Terror was one part is ignored, leaving the image of a handful of maniacs bent on blood-lust and vengeance. It's as if a history of the British suggested we all went insane around 1944, blacking out windows at night, sleeping in underground stations and sailing across to Normandy to shoot thousands on the beach for no apparent reason.
While in Egypt, Napoleon had some respect for the place he was invading. He turned the deck of his ship into a floating seminar for his army to debate matters of Egyptian culture. And he stole the Rosetta Stone, which revealed the workings of hieroglyphics, though the British stole it back off him later and kept it for themselves. But at this point comes the incident which does what you might have thought was impossible, and makes you feel sorry for Napoleon. Just as he was about to launch the Battle of the Nile against the Royal Navy, his friend Junot told him that Joséphine was spending every available moment with Hippolyte Charles. This in itself must have been a blow to Napoleon's ego, but on hearing this he wrote letters to friends, and to Joséphine, detailing his torment at the news, only to find the ship carrying the letters intercepted by the British, who then published them in the _Morning Chronicle_.
Where Robespierre was driven by intellect and inquiry, Danton was motivated by passion. Where Robespierre spoke with a calculating tone, Danton delivered spontaneous drama. History presents him as so diametrically opposed to Robespierre that you wonder whether their relationship has been devised by a Hollywood screenplay writer. The result would be Bruce Willis as Robespierre, Danton played by Jim Carrey, and a trailer that began "Max liked the Social Contract - Georges liked social drinking. One was incorruptible - the other was irredeemable. But they were stuck with each other in _Georges and Max's wild week-end in Paris._ Then we'd see them yelling at each other, then Robespierre saying, "I feel so ashamed at what I did with that tart," and Danton replying, "I have that feeling every night - you'll get used to it."
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